The Schoolmaster eBook

president of the Zemstvo, Marfutkin, kissed my hand
after lunch, held it a long while to his lips, and,
wagging his head in an absurd way, burst into tears:
so much feeling but no words! Father Yevmeny,
that delightful little old man, sat down by me, and
looking tearfully at me kept babbling something like
a child. I did not understand what he said, but
I know how to understand true feeling. The police
captain, the handsome man of whom I wrote to you,
went down on his knees to me, tried to read me some
verses of his own composition (he is a poet), but .
. . his feelings were too much for him, he lurched
and fell over . . . that huge giant went into hysterics,
you can imagine my delight! The day did not pass
without a hitch, however. Poor Alalykin, the president
of the judges’ assembly, a stout and apoplectic
man, was overcome by illness and lay on the sofa in
a state of unconsciousness for two hours. We
had to pour water on him. . . . I am thankful
to Doctor Dvornyagin: he had brought a bottle
of brandy from his dispensary and he moistened the
patient’s temples, which quickly revived him,
and he was able to be moved. . . .”

A BAD BUSINESS

“WHO goes there?”

No answer. The watchman sees nothing, but through
the roar of the wind and the trees distinctly hears
someone walking along the avenue ahead of him.
A March night, cloudy and foggy, envelopes the earth,
and it seems to the watchman that the earth, the sky,
and he himself with his thoughts are all merged together
into something vast and impenetrably black. He
can only grope his way.

“Who goes there?” the watchman repeats,
and he begins to fancy that he hears whispering and
smothered laughter. “Who’s there?”

“It’s I, friend . . .” answers an
old man’s voice.

“But who are you?”

“I . . . a traveller.”

“What sort of traveller?” the watchman
cries angrily, trying to disguise his terror by shouting.
“What the devil do you want here? You go
prowling about the graveyard at night, you ruffian!”

“You don’t say it’s a graveyard
here?”

“Why, what else? Of course it’s the
graveyard! Don’t you see it is?”

“O-o-oh . . . Queen of Heaven!” there
is a sound of an old man sighing. “I see
nothing, my good soul, nothing. Oh the darkness,
the darkness! You can’t see your hand before
your face, it is dark, friend. O-o-oh. . .”

“But who are you?”

“I am a pilgrim, friend, a wandering man.”

“The devils, the nightbirds. . . . Nice
sort of pilgrims! They are drunkards . . .”
mutters the watchman, reassured by the tone and sighs
of the stranger. “One’s tempted to
sin by you. They drink the day away and prowl
about at night. But I fancy I heard you were not
alone; it sounded like two or three of you.”